If you are like most people, you probably spend hours indoors and a large portion of your day sitting behind a desk. It’s difficult to avoid as most work is done on a computer and many hours may be spent each week commuting back and forth to work.

In fact, according to the National Human Activity Pattern Survey (NHAPS) commissioned by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), most people spent at least 93 percent of their time indoors or in the car.

Global studies show people are sitting at least 7.7 hours each day, on average, and sit as much as 15 hours a day.

Most Americans have to sit all day at work, but a new survey commissioned by Egotron found that 70 percent of people dislike sitting all day, and when they do get up at work, 56 percent use getting food as an excuse.3 According to this survey, Americans were sitting an average of 13 hours each day.

Jumping Instead of Sitting

Mounting research suggests that sitting is an independent risk factor for poor health and premature death, even when you exercise regularly. Sometimes getting started or finding the motivation is difficult.

Research by Joan Vernikos, Ph.D., former director of National Aeronautics Space Administration’s (NASA) Life Sciences Division and author of “Sitting Kills, Moving Heals,” presents a simple yet powerful scientific explanation for why sitting has such a dramatic impact on your health, and how you can simply and easily counteract the ill effects of sitting.

She found it was the change in posture that was a powerful signal, and not the act of standing. In other words, the key to counteract the ill effects of prolonged sitting is to repeatedly and frequently interrupt your sitting. If you stand 35 times at one time, the benefit is not as great as if you stand up once every 15 to 20 minutes.

One way to offset the effects of prolonged sitting is jumping. A new study by the American Council on Exercise (ACE), found that jumping on a mini-trampoline or rebounder for less than 20 minutes was as good as running, less stressful on your joints, and may even be more fun.

However, you don’t need a rebounder in your office to experience benefits. Standing at your desk every 20 minutes and jumping in place several times may offer different benefits to your bones, and increases your heart rate.

Why Jumping Is Easier on Your Body Than Running

According to the Arthritis Foundation, every pound of excess weight places an additional 4 pounds of pressure on your knees when walking.9 So if you are 10 pounds overweight, this amounts to 40 pounds of extra pressure on your knees with each step, increasing your risk of knee pain.

Running places an even greater amount of stress on your knees. In a study published in the Journal of Orthopedic and Sports Physical Therapy, researchers evaluated stress on the knee joint based on the runner’s speed. Their study revealed that speed plays a vital role in how much impact your knee receives.

Although the amount of stress increased as speed increased, the overall stress experienced was less at higher speed, as the runners used a lower number of strides to cover the same distance.
This means that even if you carry just a few extra pounds, running can put a significant amount of stress on your knees.

On the other hand, a rebounder or trampoline offers a platform that gives under your weight and absorbs some of the impact on your joints. However, even with less impact it continues to offer you a cardiovascular and core strengthening workout.

Jumping Provides Greater Fitness Benefits Than Running

Rebounding, or jumping on a mini-trampoline in your home, gained popularity in the 1980s following a study commissioned by NASA, in which they compared the oxygen uptake and body distribution between running and jumping on a mini-trampoline.

The intention was to find a form of exercise that could reduce the effects of deconditioning of their astronauts while in a weightless environment.

The results showed athletes experienced the greatest amount of stress in their ankles and legs while running, whereas the force on a trampoline was more equally distributed between the lower legs and the back and head.

These were lower forces than the athlete experienced running, but at the same oxygen uptake. This means the athletes were working equally hard when running and jumping, but experiencing less force on their body while jumping.

The benefits the athletes experienced at a cellular level were greater and at less force than running.12 Athletes also enjoyed increased force on the rebounder with less stress on the heart and less oxygen used. Specifically, the researchers wrote:

“The magnitude of biomechanical stimulation is greater with jumping on a trampoline than with running, a finding that might help identify acceleration parameters needed for the design of remedial procedures to avert deconditioning in persons exposed to weightlessness.”

If oxygen uptake were equal between the two exercises, athletes participating in trampoline jumping gained 68 percent more benefit than those who were running.

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